


If You Believe in Me (I'll Still Believe)

by sunkelles



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms
Genre: Bisexual Theon Greyjoy, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Forced Ramsay/Jeyne, Forced Ramsay/Theon, Gen, Happy Ending, M/M, Mentions of Rape, Misgendering, Misogynistic Slurs, Misogyny, Motifs, Motifs EVERYWHERE, Non-Graphic Rape, Ramsay is His Own Warning, Trans Male Character, Trans Theon Greyjoy, Transphobia, book canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-06
Updated: 2019-07-06
Packaged: 2020-06-09 14:35:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19477912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunkelles/pseuds/sunkelles
Summary: Theon Greyjoy is trans. This complicates things, but it doesn't change anything at the core. He's still just searching for somewhere to belong, and he takes a long and painful road to get there.





	If You Believe in Me (I'll Still Believe)

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. this is now the longest one-shot that i've ever written, so yeah, this one is a big boi. many words, many motifs, many feels  
> 2\. i've been thinking a lot about the morality of the ideology that cis folks shouldn't write about trans people, straight people shouldn't write about gay people etc, and i came to the conclusion that i think that's not really reasonable? how are people supposed to get better at trying to understand each other and seeing each other as just another way to do this human thing if we can't write about people who aren't exactly like us? in a lot of ways, writing is an exercise where you try out being other people, and if you can't do that with people who aren't the same gender/sexuality/race/etc as you then how are you supposed to try to process that experience? also there are very, very few fics exploring the idea of trans people in canon era westeros and zero canon examples. i thought that someone needed to remedy that. trans people have always been around, everywhere, and westeros wouldn't be the exception. it would just be a hard place to be one.  
> 3\. on the other hand, i AM a cis woman and if you notice something glaringly, hideously awful, please do let me know? there's transphobia baked into the very setting of this story for a lot of reasons including strict gender hierarchy, misogyny, and because there aren't really WORDS for theon to use to describe himself, but i still want this to be affirming more than not.  
> 4\. i was thinking about theon's relationships with women and the way that he'd internalized the concepts of misogyny in conjunction with a few experiences i'd heard about from friends who are trans boys and a young adult novel i read with a trans boy protag called "I Am J" and then this kind of spiraled from there.  
> 5\. the title is from mumford and sons' "holland road" which is very fitting for this fic. if you haven't listened to it yet, i highly suggest it. it's a good ass song  
> 6\. the name althea came from a fem! theon fic that i read recently, but i'd be damned if i could find it again. sorry fam.  
> 7\. ramsay: if you think this has a happy ending-  
> me, kicking him in the nuts: theon greyjoy and jeyne poole are getting a soft epilogue you sick fuck

His mother names him Althea. Asha names him Thea. 

The way that Asha tells it, she and mother had been arguing about the nickname. Asha said that Althea was too long and she wasn’t going to say it for her whole life. Mother had said that it was an old Harlaw name, and that Asha shouldn’t butcher it by chopping it to bits like men’s fingers after they’re done with the dagger game. 

Asha had said Thea, mother had said Althea, and they went back and forth for a while, Thea babbling in the background. Then, they finally started paying attention, and Thea squalled “Thea!” Their mother had fallen in love with the nickname when she heard Thea say it out of his own tiny, little mouth.

Thea prefers it to Althea, but he doesn’t _like_ it. Thea is still a girl’s name, and he is not a girl. Maybe someday he can convince the world of that. 

* * *

Thea is sitting on a blanket, watching the waves roll up onto the shore. 

Everywhere on the Iron Islands smells of salt, but when he’s this close to the sea the scent seems to waft into his nose and lean against the fleshy sides. It’s not an unpleasant sensation, but it’s a strong one. He watches the dark waves crash against the black sand, and considers picking up the blanket and moving it further back. 

Asha would make fun of him, though. Thea likes Asha, but he likes Asha less when she makes fun of him. 

Thea looks behind him to a line of wildflowers growing out of the cracks in the black cliff. Asha grabs a handful of daisies and brings them back to their blanket. 

“Flowers for the little lady Greyjoy?” she asks. Thea frowns, but doesn’t reply. He looks out to sea again instead. From some of the beaches, they can see islands near Pyke off on the horizon. Most of the beaches on the island have views that are destroyed by whole armadas of ships, filled with Ironborn trying to make their name and their fortune in their floating castles, but not here. 

At this little cove, they can see nothing but sea for miles and miles until the water finally meets the horizon. That would be because the water is shallow and the jagged rocks jut up nearly to the surface. No sane captain would steer his ship near Shark Teeth Cove, no matter how pretty the view might be. 

Asha throws the flowers into Thea’s lap, and he lets them stay. To Asha, he’s the soft little sister. He’s compassionate and small and doesn’t like it when they hit thralls or the men say mean things about the saltwives. Of course he’d like something pretty and delicate like a clump of flowers in his lap. 

He’s tried to tell Asha that he doesn’t like flowers, or gowns, or the jeweled combs mother sometimes brings Asha that Asha tries to shove at her. Whenever Asha gives him one of the feminine things that she doesn’t want, Thea tries to protest but Asha won’t have it. 

“You’re the better looking of us anyway,” Asha says, “might as well be the pretty little lady you’re meant to be.” 

Thea finds Asha’s hands in his lap for a second, taking one of the flowers out of it. They’re daisies, if he remembers the name right. They have little yellow centers and bright white petals coming out of them like arms off the body of a kraken. Asha softly places one of the flowers behind his ear. 

“It’s perfect,” she says. Thea knows what he must look like, with his little golden gown and his long black hair and the tiny little daisy at his ear. He must look like the pretty little lady everyone’s always saying it is. He feels a momentary burst of anger, and he rips the flower out of his hair. 

Asha reaches over quickly, a little frantically. 

“Thea,” she scolds, trying to take the flower out of Thea’s hands to place back in his hair. Thea pulls it away from her and rips the petals from the flowerhead. All of the white petals fall down onto her lap, and Thea rips the head from the stem and throws them both away from her, just for good measure. 

Asha, surprisingly, doesn’t look ready to rip Thea apart like the flower. She looks entertained. 

“You’re supposed to say _he loves me, he loves me not_ when you do that, you know,” Asha says. 

“What?” Thea asks. 

“When you rip a flower to bits like that. You’re supposed to say “he loves me, he loves me not”. It’s supposed to tell you whether or not the boy you love loves you.” Thea frowns. This was not the reaction that he was expecting. It’s not a reaction that he’d want either. 

Asha takes a daisy from his lap and then places it in his hand. Then she holds up her own. She starts to demonstrate, plucking off a petal. 

“He loves me,” then she picks off another, “he loves me not.” She plucks and talks until she’s done with the flower and the sad, petalless flowerhead on a stem is the only thing she’s left holding.

“If you end on a petal where you say he loves me, like this, that means that the boy loves you. If you end on a petal where you say he loves me not, that means that he doesn’t.” Thea’s always been good enough at sums. The only lady lessons that he and Asha got were how to do math and run a household. 

“Can’t you just rig it?” Thea asks, “see if the number of petals is even or odd and then start a certain way?” Thea doesn’t want to pluck a flower to see if a boy will love him (he doesn’t want a boy) but it seems dumb. 

“You’d think,” Asha says, “but that sucks out all the adventure.” If there’s one thing that Thea knows about Asha, it’s that she wants adventure. Asha wants her own ship to command around the kingdoms, reaving and razing as she travels up to Skagos and down all the way to Sunspear, then all the way up the Eastern coast of Westeros. Then she’d go East to Essos and become the first Ironborn to reave her way through the Eastern continent. 

Asha has big dreams for herself, but small dreams for her sister. 

“You want a new flower? You can check to see if that Blacktyde boy who was giving you eyes would be true.” Thea is seven, and he doesn’t think that any boy should be giving him eyes at this point. 

“No, I don’t,” Thea says. 

“Don’t you want to know if he loves you?” Thea shakes his head no. Thea might dream of a gallant prince, on occasion, but not nearly as often as he dreams of a beautiful maiden. And frankly, Queron Blacktyde would be no gallant prince. 

“Why not?” Asha asks indulgently. Thea is tired of this conversation. He’s tired of being told he should be wearing flowers in his hair or decimating them to decide if a boy will love him. Theon is tired of it. 

“It’s too _girly_ ” Thea says, crossing his arms over his chest. Asha laughs at him, then. 

“Girly?” Asha scorns girly things, sometimes, but it’s clear she thinks her baby sister shouldn’t. Asha has very clear ideas in her head about how Thea should behave. 

“I’m a boy,” Thea says, “I shouldn’t be girly” Asha laughs and stands up. Then she gathers Thea up in her arms, spinning him around. Asha drops him on the middle of the blanket, and Thea feels glued to the blanket by dizziness. 

“You’re not a boy, Thea,” Asha says. 

“I am,” Thea says, and he is, he can feel it in his bones. He’s not just Ironborn, he’s an iron man. The dizziness is settling down, and Thea pushes himself up from the blanket. Asha rolls her eyes. 

“Sure you are. You’re Dalton Greyjoy himself.” She ruffles Thea’s hair, and considers the issue closed. Thea does not consider the issue closed. The issue is only beginning to brew like a springtime storm, ready to rip the windows and doors off the hinges of Pyke. 

* * *

Little Thea Greyjoy is tired of dresses. He’s tired of japes from his brothers about the pretty little lady and his father ignoring him and his sister protecting him and trying to put flowers in his hair. He’s tired of hair that goes down his back and his mother combing it and calling him her baby girl. He’s not a lady. He’s supposed to be out there wielding a sword and japing with the men. He’s not supposed to need to be protected. 

He takes his sister’s dagger to his chambers and looks out on the raging sea, tossing and turning like he does on a sleepless night. Then he takes the dagger and cuts off all his hair. Not to his ears, like Asha cuts hers, but so short that it’s barely there. His mother walks in on him, and her eyes are filled with horror the moment that she sees the peach fuzz on his head. 

“What did you do to your hair?” his mother asks. 

“I cut it.” 

“Why?” 

“I didn’t want it anymore,” he says. Mother runs a sad hand over his head, feeling the harsh, sharp little bits of what used to be his black locks, and sighs. 

“You shouldn’t have done this, Thea? What will your father do?” When his father _does_ see him, he slaps him across the face. 

“No daughter of mine will behave like this,” he growls. It’s the first time that Thea’s father has paid attention to him in years.

“I’m not your daughter,” Thea says. He knows it’s stupid and he should just let it lie, but he just wants his father to know.

“What?” father demands, and Thea can see him pulling his hand back, getting ready for another slap. 

“I’m your son,” Thea says. Father’s lip curls. 

“I have two sons. You’re not one of them.” 

“I am,” Thea says, “that’s why I cut my hair. I’d wear britches, like Asha, if you let me. I’d be a good son!” 

“You wouldn’t be a good anything,” father growls, “I can’t stand to look at you, whatever you are.” Mother puts a hand on father’s shoulder and sends him a soft look. 

“Whatever Thea is, it doesn’t hurt us,” his mother says. His father goes off in a huff, and mother takes Thea back to his own room. She kisses his nearly bald head and takes his fingers in her hands and kisses them. 

“It’s alright, baby,” she says, “whatever you are, I love you.” She smiles then. 

“If you’re my baby boy, then you’re my baby boy.” Something blooms within his chest. 

Boy. Someone finally said it, that word he’d wanted to hear his whole life. 

Boy. 

Thea gets bolder, after that. He doesn’t dare talk to his father about it, or Rodrik, or Maron, but he thinks that Asha at least ought to know for real this time. Asha’s the only one who cares for him outside of his mother. Perhaps she’ll call him boy too if he asks her too again. 

“I’m not a girl,” Thea says softly, clutching his stuffed kraken, Kraky, to his chest. 

“Then what do you think you are, a kraken?” Asha teases. She plucks Kracky out of Thea’s arms and then holds the toy high above his head.

“Give him back!” Thea demands, jumping up and trying to rip Kraky out of her hands. Asha puts one hand on her hip and looks down at him as she holds Kraky up higher. 

“Admit you’re a girl and I might,” Asha says. Thea hates when Asha takes Kraky away. She always makes him say uncle or that she’s the better sister or just an I love you when Thea’s pissed off. Things he says under threat of her keeping Kraky away are never true, but Thea feels a storm brewing in his stomach about this one. 

This one feels different than the others, final and wrong and bad. He doesn’t know the word for it, but whatever it is makes him feel small and sick and ready to fight. 

“I _am_ a boy!” Asha rolls her eyes. 

“And I’m Good Queen Alysanne.” Asha drops Kraky on the ground, then. Maybe it’s a peace offering, or maybe Asha’s just tired of holding it so high. Either way, Thea scoops his toy up in his arms and clutches Kraky tightly so Asha can’t snatch him back this time.

“I _mean_ it,” Thea says, “I’m a boy. That’s why I cut off all my hair.” He just wants Asha to understand. 

“Cutting your hair off doesn’t make you a boy,” Asha says, “didn’t make me one.” 

“This is different,” Thea says, but he doesn’t know how to explain it to her. It’s one of those feelings that he doesn’t know how to explain, he just knows that he feels it so strongly. It feels like standing on the beach and being struck down by a wave and then getting caught up in the surf. 

He’d know, too. He almost found himself in the Drowned God’s halls that way once. If Asha hadn’t swam in to get him, he’d be feasting deep under the seas now. 

“You’re a girl, Thea,” Asha says, “I’m sorry that it sucks, but it is what it is.” Asha does sound apologetic this time, but it’s not enough. It’s not true, and Thea hates it. 

“I’m not a girl!” Thea shouts. He just wants Asha to understand! She’s his big sister, the one who always protected him from those scary things that lurk in the dark and their father and their older brothers and the men that leer at them because they think they can steal away the Greyjoy’s daughters when he has his back turned. She saved him from drowning! 

She teases him and plays with him and makes him feel better when he feels like curling up in a ball and dying. Asha’s always cared about him- always understood him. He doesn’t understand why she shouldn’t now. 

“Shut up,” Asha tells him, “just because being a girl is shit doesn’t mean you’re not one. You want to be tough? Girls can be tough too. What about Visenya? Rhaenyra? Nymeria down in Dorne?” Thea feels an odd bit of guilt at that. He knows that women can be tough, at other places and other times, but he _isn’t_ one. He isn’t a girl. He doesn’t know how to get that through his family’s skulls. 

“You’re tough, but I’m not.” Asha is Nymeria and Thea is some joke of a prince. 

“You’ll get tougher,” Asha promises him, “women always have to.” 

“But I’m _not_ one,” Thea says. Asha doesn’t seem so indulgent then. 

“Whatever, Thea.” He can tell that he won’t win this battle today, so Thea stops fighting. He’ll only piss Asha off further, and that wouldn’t be worth it. Mother and Asha are the only two people who care about him in all of Pyke, and he wouldn’t want to ruin it. Thea will let it lie, at least for now. It’s better than this ending in tears and blood. 

Deciding to let it lie for the day doesn’t mean letting it lie forever. He tries again. And again. And again. 

He just wants Asha to acknowledge it like mother has, but every time that Thea brings it up Asha gets more adamant about it. _You’re a girl, stop pretending to be something you’re not. Do you hate girls so much? Do you hate mother? Do you hate_ **_me?_ **

Thea doesn’t let the guilt or the fear of rejection stop him, in the end, but sometimes he wonders if he should. 

Asha loves Thea, but Thea can tell that she hates him too, because Asha wants a sister and Thea doesn’t want to be one. They still try to make it work. 

Since Thea’s relationship with his father was never any good (or anything at all) he worries little about what the man thinks. When Asha offers him a pair of hand-me-down britches that she specifically calls “girl britches” Thea doesn’t protest on the name and starts wearing them immediately. He just accepts it as one step on the journey to being accepted as a boy. Girl britches might turn into boy britches, one day. At least if his father doesn’t rip them away from him and burn them first. 

“Take those off now,” father growls. Thea tries not to look frightened by this, even though he is. 

“No,” Thea says. Father looks ready to claw Thea’s eyes out. 

“Little girls don’t wear britches.” 

“I’m a boy,” Thea says. He tries to sound firm in it, but he can hear his voice quivering. Thea is not brave like a boy should be. Mother, thankfully, backs him up. 

“If Thea says that she’s a boy, then she’s a boy,” his mother says. His father looks at his wife with hate in his eyes. 

“Don’t encourage this, Alannys.” She sighs in response. 

“What will it hurt, Balon?” 

“Her marriage prospects, my standing. What will my men say if they hear I let my daughter parade around in britches and claim to be a man!”  
  
“Asha parades around in britches. You don’t stop her.” 

“Asha does not claim to be a man,” Balon says, “and if she did, I might believe her. At least she has the stones for it.” Thea feels something unpleasant settle in his stomach, like he’s just swallowed a whole gulp of seawater. 

“Balon-” 

“Thea is weak as a lass in the greenlands. If she were a son, she’d be a useless one.” Thea feels tears pooling in his eyes. 

“I am not,” he says, tears leaking out of his eyes. Just because he can’t fight like Asha does doesn’t make him weak. He’s five years younger than her. He shouldn’t be expected to be as good. 

“Men don’t cry,” his father says coldly, “you’d best remember that if you’re pretending to be one.” 

His father rebels. The women (Thea hates himself as he lumps himself in with the group) are left behind on Pyke as the men go off to fight a war. His father wants independence. His father wants to be king. His father, apparently, wants a crown more than he wants his two oldest sons. Rodrik and Maron die fighting in the greenlands, and his father comes back to Pyke in shame. The king will be there within the week to finalize the surrender and pick up Asha to be his hostage and set the final terms. Whatever they are, Thea doubts they’ll be pretty. King Robert allowed The Mountain to rape and murder Elia Martell and murder her babes in cold blood without so much as a slap on the wrist because Elia Martell stood in his way. It might not be any prettier for the Greyjoys who rebelled against him when this is through. 

“We’re not princesses anymore,” Asha says, “father’s taking off the Driftwood Crown.” Thea wants to argue that he was never a princess, but he doesn’t bother. Asha gets mad whenever he reminds her that he isn’t a girl. It’s easier to be around his sister if he lets her keep her assumptions nowadays.

Father calls Thea to his solar the next day. This is a surprise because father has never called him to his solar before, ever. Thea has no idea what it could be about. 

“I have a proposition, Althea,” father says. Full name. Thea can’t tell if that’s a good sign or not. 

“You’ve always wanted to be a boy,” his father says, “what if I told you that you _could_ be one?” 

“What?” Thea asks. He couldn’t have heard that right. Father couldn’t have just said that he could be a boy. 

“Since we lost, the king is demanding a hostage,” father says. 

“You want me to be the hostage,” Thea says, deflating. Father just wants Thea to appear to be his son so King Robert will take him instead of Asha. Thea always knew that Asha was Balon’s favorite daughter. 

“You’ve always wanted to be my son, haven’t you?” Balon says. 

“I have,” Thea says. He doesn’t say that he always has been. It wouldn’t be worth his wasted breath. 

“Then you have nothing to complain about.” 

“Being a hostage means they’ll take my head off if you put on the crown again, doesn’t it?” Thea asks cautiously.

“Aye. You’re their insurance that I won’t rebel again.” Thea almost laughs at that. What insurance is _he_ of that? Father might rebel just to be rid of him for good. 

“Will you?” Thea asks. Father meets his eyes. 

“I don’t know yet,” he says, and Thea knows he’s being entirely truthful. Thea thinks of something else, then, something that might ruin this whole thing. 

“Can’t they look at the records and see that you’re lying?” 

“We’ll forge them,” father says, rummaging around his desk, “it won’t be hard. No greenlander even pays enough attention to my children to even know what your names were.” He finds his inkwell and a feather, and grasps the feather in his hand. 

“Speaking of names, you’ll need a boy’s name,” his father tells him. Thea nods. He’s been considering that for years now, but never settled on one, mainly because he thought no one would ever call him by one if he chose one. Thea considers this, and then wonders which house he'll be going with. After all, he can’t be a hostage with no one _holding_ him hostage.

“Who will be taking me?” Thea asks. It might make him giggle, if he picks out a historical name from the house of his captors. It’ll be like he’s infiltrating them. 

“The Starks.” Ah, Thea has read about the Starks. He liked The Hungry Wolf- that one defended the North from the Andal invaders. It’s a sentiment he thinks his Ironborn family would appreciate. That king’s name was Theon, and that name’s similar to Thea. He thinks he’d like that. 

“I want to be Theon,” he says. His father doesn’t ask why he chose that name, he just lets it be. 

“Theon Greyjoy,” father says thoughtfully, “it’s not what I would have chosen, but it fits. Sounds like an Ironborn.” That’s the closest that his father has ever come to saying that he approves of him. Theon supposes that he’ll take it. 

Mother and Asha escort him to his room to help him pack and apparently, to teach him about what’s in store for his body and how to hide it. Mother shows him how to properly place a rag to soak up his moonblood, when it comes, so he won’t be caught. Asha seems put out by the plan, but she tells him the best materials to use to bind his chest when it comes in so that he won’t hurt himself and won’t alert the Starks to his secret. 

“You probably won’t be in much danger on that front, though,” Asha says, “I’m almost flat as a board, and so is mother. We’re not a breasty bunch.” She _is_ right. Neither of them have much to speak of, even when Asha isn’t binding. Theon takes some comfort in that. 

“Thank the Drowned God for that,” mother says, shoving another pair of worn britches in his bag. She looks at the table and picks up her favorite jeweled comb that she gave Thea when he was a baby. 

"I suppose you can't bring this," mother says, looking sadly to the comb. It's made of silky smooth obsidian with a pearl kraken crawling up the back. Thea never liked any of the combs, but he didn't hate that one. At least it reminded him he was a Greyjoy by rights. 

“You could say it was from a girlfriend,” Asha says, waggling her eyebrows. 

“It has a kraken on it,” Theon says, “that’d mean-” Theon cuts the thought off. He doesn’t even want to imagine _courting his sister._ Asha just laughs at that, the way she laughs at just about everything. It's always teasing, but it's always annoying. 

“The Targaryens did it,” she says, waggling her damn eyebrows _again._ Theon shakes his head no no no, and Asha starts laughing and Theon feels his cheeks turn bright red. 

“Stop it!” he shrieks, and he buries his head in his hands. His mother laughs. 

“Asha, stop teasing your brother,” she says, placing a hand on Theon’s shoulder. 

“Sister,” Asha corrects. Theon takes his hands down from his face and looks up at mother. 

“Your brother,” mother says, “remember, we’re sending _Theon_ Greyjoy to the Starks, not Thea.” Asha crosses her arms. 

“Whatever,” she says. She surveys the room, checking to see if there’s anything that mother and Theon have forgotten. She nearly runs over to the bed and grabs his stuffed kraken off of it. She holds it up high for Theon to see in all his worn, fluffy glory. 

“Do you want Kraky?” she asks, with a perfect mix of teasing and questioning. 

“Pack him,” Theon says, “but put him at the bottom.” He doesn’t want the Starks to see that he’s bringing a stuffed toy, but that doesn’t mean that he won’t want his favorite stuffed toy during the cold, lonely nights at Winterfell. He hopes that it will still smell of sea air and remind him of home. 

Asha pulls the clothes up out of his trunk and pushes Kraky down to the bottom. Theon will miss him tonight, when he’s sleeping alone, but he knows he won’t want to pack him or forget him in the morning. One lonely last night is a lot better than an entire lonely lifetime up North.

King Robert and Lord Stark meet them on the docks the next morning. Mother couldn’t come, because she didn’t think that she could let Thea go if she had to leave him at the docks. 

Mother still bawled her eyes out and could barely let go of him as it was. 

“My youngest son, Thea-on,” father introduces, gesturing towards him. Theon puffs out his chest and tries to look as masculine as he can. The slip was inevitable- but he hopes that King Robert and Lord Stark don’t think anything of it. King Robert seems uninterested in this whole affair, and Lord Stark has the same hard, unfeeling look on as when he stepped onto the docks. 

“And my daughter, Asha.” Theon tries not to flinch at how much more proud

“I thought that you had two sons and two daughters,” King Robert says. 

“You thought wrong,” father says, defiant as always, “three sons and one daughter.” Then he flinches as he realizes his error. 

“One son and one daughter, now.” Lord Stark’s look softens for a moment. 

“I’m sorry for your loss,” he says. Father nods. 

“They were brave boys,” father says, “I was proud of them.” It’s the most sincere thing that Theon’s ever heard come out of his mouth. 

“Raise him to be brave and strong,” father says. 

“I’ll try,” Lord Stark promises him. Father walks over to Theon and puts a hand on his shoulder. He squeezes firmly for a moment, and then lets go. He nods to the King and Lord Stark once as a farewell. Then he walks off. It’s more than Theon expected but less than he’d hoped. Asha walks over, then. 

She wasn’t about to let father have the last goodbye when she, as she said, “raised ye myself, no help from that man”. 

“You’ll keep him safe,” Asha says, meeting Lord Stark’s eyes. Theon’s admired his sister all his life, but he’s never been quite so impressed with her as in this moment. She just met the eyes of the Warden of the North and gave him an order. 

“I’ll try, my lady,” he promises her. There’s a little spark in his eyes, and Theon wonders what it’s from. The King glares, then, and meets her eyes himself. 

“Shouldn’t you be leaving too, girl?” he huffs. Asha’s not the sort to be cowed, but being scolded by _the King_ leaves even her looking a little frightened. 

“Let the boy have a moment with his sister,” Lord Stark says. King Robert actually looks contrite at that, and then doesn’t say another word. 

“Alright,” King Robert says, “I’ll go back to the ship. I’m sure you can handle this, Ned.” Lord Stark nods. 

“It’s fine, Robert,” he agrees. As soon as King Robert is out of sight, Asha turns back into her normal self.

“I don’t really know what to say,” Theon says. He didn’t know what to say with mother, either. What do you say when you’re being dragged off as a hostage and might never see your family again? At least with father, it was easy. Theon wasn't going to miss his father. Things are more complicated with mother and Asha. He’s actually going to miss them. 

“Stay safe, _little brother,_ ” she says. Theon feels his heart nearly fly out of his chest at that, though Asha says little brother as a bit of a jape. 

“You too,” Theon says. Then, Asha drags him into a bone-crushing hug. She lets her grip slip slightly after a moment, but holds him for a while after that. He can feel her chest rising and falling with her breath. 

In

Out 

She’s still here

In 

Out 

Not gone yet

In 

Out 

Just a few more moments of home, of his sister, of the smell of the sea and the rocks of Pyke and the Drowned God stirring underneath the docks. 

In 

Out 

In 

Asha finally breaks the hug, and grabs him by the shoulders, one hand on each. Her eyes are dark and somber as she meets his. 

“Don’t let them bleed the iron out of you,” she tells him. Theon feels his eyes getting misty. He knows this can’t drag on much longer or he’ll start bawling like a babe straight off his mother’s breast. Asha drops her hands then, and nods at him. 

“You’ll be alright,” she tells him. He nods. She turns towards the castle and gives it a quick look. Then she looks back to him. 

“I’ll see you soon,” Asha promises. It’s easier to say that than goodbye- less final that way. Theon nods. 

“See you soon,” he promises. Then, Asha turns around and starts her hike back up to Pyke. Theon turns his own way, towards the ship that will take him to Winterfell. 

“Theon,” he says gently, “you’re going the wrong way.” Theon feels his face flush bright red. 

“I knew that,” he says. Lord Stark doesn’t address it, and instead leads him towards the ship clearly flying the direwolf banner. They walk in silence for a moment, and if Theon had his way, it would stay silent until they get to Winterfell. Even though Ned Stark is known as The Quiet Wolf, he doesn’t let the silence stick. It’s a bit annoying. 

“You’re close with your sister?” he asks. There’s something sad in the question, though it’s supposed to be smalltalk. 

“Aye,” Theon says. That’s all that he’ll give the man. He doesn’t want to talk to him. 

“I used to be close with my sister. I wish that we were closer.” Theon knows enough about Lord Stark’s sister to know she ripped the realm apart and died in a tower in Dorne. Theon doesn’t know how to respond to talk of her. 

“At least you and your sister will see each other again,” Lord Stark says with a hint of a smile. Empty words and empty smiles. Theon wants none of it. This man is trying to be soft with him, but Theon knows he’ll take his head off if the situation demands it. Theon being ten won’t change anything.

“Come now, Theon,” Lord Stark says, inclining his head towards the ship that will take him so far from home, “you’ll like Winterfell.” 

Theon knows that he won’t. He’s going far from home, far from the iron flowing through his veins to be made a hostage to his father’s good behavior. But there’s one thing he knows that he will like about Winterfell. He’ll like finally getting to be a boy. 

Lord Stark tries to talk to him a little more during the journey, but Theon is sullen and withdrawn. Eventually he gets the man to stop trying. When they reach shore, Lord Stark and King Robert say their manly, best friend goodbyes and then the Stark host splits off and makes their way to Winterfell. It’s cold and unpleasant. Theon quickly realizes that he barely knows how to ride a horse.

It’s humiliating. He’s ten years old and finally allowed to be a boy, he should be a better horseman than this now, but at Pyke they have little need for horses. He was considered a daughter as well, which made his riding lessons nearly nonexistent. His brothers shoved him on a horse once or twice to laugh at him as they tried to spook it and get the horse to him off, but he didn’t get much experience learning how to handle it beyond yanking the reins in a certain direction and hoping that would make the damn thing turn or stop. 

The men eventually tire of Theon's terrible skills, and Stark’s captain of guards rides up behind him and grabs him. He slings Theon off of his own horse and throws him in front of him on his lap, in between Cassel's body and the saddle horn. He shoves his legs down towards the stirrups, but Theon is far from able to reach them with his little boy legs. 

“Put me down,” Theon hisses. Another one of the Stark party rides up behind Theon’s horse and throws a rope around the mare’s neck to lead along with his own horse. 

“Do you want to walk?” Cassel asks him. 

“No,” Theon says, “I want to ride my own horse.”

“Maybe when you can ride like a man and not a frightened maid.” 

“I can ride,” Theon demands, turning his head around to glare at Cassel. The man takes one hand off the reins and turns Theon around. 

“If you rode yourself we’d never get to Winterfell. We’d die of old age somewhere ‘tween here and the Neck.” Theon feels his face flush. The man across from him who took hold of his horse looks over to him with a softer look. 

“I know it’s embarrassing to ride with someone,” he says, “but I think it’s less embarrassing than holding up the party. It’s better this way.” Theon hates that idea, but he thinks that maybe the man is right. He doesn’t protest, even though he hates riding in what’s basically Cassel’s lap. 

He doesn’t protest anymore, because he thinks it would be futile, but he prays to the Drowned God that the man can’t tell from riding with him that he hasn’t got a cock down there. 

Thankfully, the rest of the ride to Winterfell is uneventful, at least in terms of embarrassment. The men seem to forget that he’s there, almost, which Theon can appreciate. He sees more of the world in those few weeks than he ever expected to. 

They cross miles and miles of flat, green landscape coated in tall trees with bright green leaves and fjord about a thousand little streams before they leave the Riverlands. In the Neck, he appreciates riding in front of a better horseman as Cassel forces his stead through the thick, nasty mud of the swaps. When they get to the North, the trees look like little green triangles against mountains as rocky as the ones in the Isles. By the time that they get to Winterfell, the land is flat again, but the trees still look like those bright green triangles. 

When they arrive at Winterfell, Lord Start introduces him to his entire household. Lady Stark doesn’t look pleased to meet Theon, but forces a courteous smile. Robb, his eldest, looks at Theon with excited curiosity. Sansa, the three year old, smiles over at him, but he’d think the three year old would smile at anything. Arya, the babe, doesn’t have any reaction. He meets the Maester and the Master-of-Arms and the Steward and all the other relevant servants, and he at least tries to remember names. Lord Stark clearly respects those in his service, and he would get put out if Theon forgot them, at least the important ones. 

Then Theon meets his bastard. Jon Snow, raised alongside his trueborn siblings. His father clearly loves him, and he says that once Robb’s ready to start lessons, it will be the three of them. Robb, Theon, and the bastard. It pisses Theon off, but he elects to just try to ignore the kid as much as possible.

As soon as Lord Stark’s done introducing him to people and leaves Theon to his new room, Robb peaks his head in through the door.

“Hi,” Robb says. 

“Hi,” Theon says.

“Can I come in?” Robb asks. 

“Might as well,” Theon says, “you’re already half in.” Robb is six and doesn’t seem to understand that Theon’s expressing displeasure, so he finishes opening up the door and comes right in. 

“Do you want me to show you around the castle?” Robb asks. 

“I’ve seen it,” Theon says. He wants to unpack and stop having to think about talking to people and just stop thinking. Maybe sleep for hours and hours. 

“Father didn’t show you everything,” Robb says. 

“Alright,” Theon says, “give me the tour.” Robb shows him just about everything. The stables are stables. Lord Stark’s solar is a solar. The kitchens are kitchens. Really, what Robb shows him isn’t that exciting, but Robb himself is excited by it. His little blue eyes light up as he sneaks them a pair of lemon cakes from the kitchen or when he picks up his sister in the nursery and hands her to Theon to hold. Arya starts screeching when she lands in Theon’s arms, but Robb assures him it’s not personal. 

“Arya’s a loud baby,” he says sagely. Theon rolls his eyes, and he tries to keep her in his arms as the baby starts flailing around. Then Robb blushes. 

“Not always that loud,” he says sheepishly, taking Arya out of Theon's arms and trying to rock her back to sleep. Arya just keeps screeching. Robb sets Arya gently down in her crib. 

"Shush," he tells her, "you're going to get me in trouble." 

“Robb!” Lady Stark calls out from another room, “did you pick Arya up again when she was napping!” 

“No!” Robb calls back. Arya cries out again, flailing a little in her crib. 

“ROBB!” 

“We should run,” Robb says, and then he runs out of the nursery and down the hall and out of the castle. Theon finds himself nearly out of breath when they’re finally in the yard. 

“Okay,” Robb says, “I think we’re safe.” A grin crosses his face. 

“Now I’ll show you the yard,” he says. It’s a little chilly out, and Theon can’t imagine there’s much that’s interesting to see out here in the yard. 

“That is, in fact, a yard,” Theon says, looking first at the trees, and then the stables off to the side, and then more trees. 

“Can we go now?” he asks. 

“I have to show you the godswood,” Robb says. 

“The f-” Theon stops mid-word, realizing that Lord Stark probably won’t like it if he teaches his little lordling to swear, “what is a godswood?” 

“That’s where father’s gods live,” Robb says. 

“Your father’s gods live in the trees?” Theon asks. He knows that his own god lives in the ocean, but he wouldn’t suspect that Ned Stark’s gods lived and were confined to a single copse. 

“Well, they live in the heart tree, I think,” Robb says, “it’s the specialest tree in the godswood. Father always has us pray in front of it.” Theon couldn’t see gods living together, cramped, in one tree, but he’s not about to argue with Robb about where his own gods reside. He follows the boy without complaint through the yard until they come upon the copse. 

Robb leads him through the thick of the weird triangle trees until they come upon a clearing. He sees a pond then, and what must be the heart tree. What can _only_ be the heart tree. Theon’s never seen anything like it before. The trunk of the tree is as white as snow, and its branches twist and twirl as they make their way up to the sky. At the tips of the branches, the red leaves seem to stretch to the sky. In the very middle of the stark, white trunk are deep holes that almost resemble a face. It's quite ominous. Maybe Robb _was_ right about the gods living in the thing. 

Theon glances down at Robb and back to the tree. He realizes, quickly, that the leaves are the same color as his hair. It makes him look as though he belongs here among his sacred trees and his father’s gods. 

Robb picks a red leaf and hands it to Theon. The texture is smooth and thin, which he finds strange, but Theon’s not exactly sure what he expected tree leaves to feel like. They didn’t have any in the Iron Islands, and he wasn’t about to go prancing off on their ride to Winterfell to gather leaves and wild flowers like a little girl. 

“Do the rest of the leaves feel like these?” 

“Those trees don’t have leaves. They have needles.” 

“Needles?” Theon asks incredulously. He thought that everything was supposed to be softer in the greenlands, even the plants. If these plants are ready to stab him, he might need to change that assumption. 

“Come on,” Robb says, leading him over to the trees that make the border of the godswood, “you have to touch them!” Up close, Theon can see that the triangle trees are made of smaller, spikier triangles. Robb rips one of them off, and hands it to Theon. He runs his hand along the edges, and then gently pokes himself with the point 

“It’s scratchy,” Theon says, though he shouldn’t be surprised. Robb _did_ say they had needles. 

“I don’t like it.” The scent is weird too. Something fresh and clean, but kind of sharp too. It doesn’t smell a thing like the briny sea air or the cooking fish that always came from the kitchen. Maybe Theon just doesn’t like it because it doesn’t smell like home. 

“No,” Robb says, “these trees are the _best.”_ His eyes are wide with excitement as he says that, looking up at the tree with awe. 

“And why’s that?” 

“There’s tons of little stabby bits. It’s like the tree’s coated in swords,” Robb says, “I think that’s pretty cool.” 

“A sword tree,” Theon says, nodding his head. He can get behind the concept. Then, Theon rips a pair of needles off the tree, and stabs Robb in the arm with one. Robb doesn’t yelp in pain, but he does glare. 

“That’s not honruhbul,” he says, the big word getting all garbled in his mouth. 

“It is if we both fight with them,” Theon says, grinning at him. Robb figures out what he means immediately and rips off his own sword to fight with. They aren’t stable enough to make a good fight, but they sure try. Then they both find branches, and make a better duel of it. 

It’s fun. It’s the first time since Theon left Pyke that he could say he had _fun._ Theon doesn’t quite know what to make of that. 

* * *

Robb drags him all around the castle as the days go by, and he makes up about a thousand different games for the two of them to play. Little boy games where they’re knights doing battle or searching for dragon eggs or fighting off the dead who’ve come walking. Sometimes Jon will come, and sometimes he won’t, but it’s always just the boys. Robb says so, once, when Sansa comes wanting to play: _sorry, boys only._ That’s all Theon’s ever wanted, honestly. To be seen as a boy. 

Robb doesn’t think he’s a girl, or a weakling, or a pretender. Theon likes the attention, and he finds he quite likes Robb too.

They grow up. Day by day, lesson by lesson, Theon goes from a boy to almost a man grown. Puberty hits fast, and with that, attraction. God, the women he’d sleep with. He wants to sleep with servant girls and tavern girls and whores, but he knows no matter how much he wants to, he can’t. 

But he also knows that if he _doesn’t,_ people will talk. If he sleeps with these girls, they might spill his secret, but if he doesn’t sleep with anyone, word might get around that he doesn’t swing that way, and he can’t have that. Theon needs people not doubting anything about his manhood. So, he gets an idea. 

Late one night, when Robb’s off playing some game with his trueborn siblings and the bastard, Theon sneaks out and makes his way to the brothel. 

“You’re dressed nice for a place like this,” one of the girls says, sending him a flirty smile. 

“I don’t dress beneath my station,” he says smoothly. 

“Your station,” she says, “and what is that?” She adjusts her dress, and her breasts nearly come pouring out. Theon adjusts his stance for a moment, trying to relieve a little of the _need_ he’s starting to feel down there. Drowned God, it’ll be hard to leave here without bedding anyone. 

“Heir to the Iron Islands,” he says. 

“Ah, a lord,” she says, and she walks closer, puts a hand on his shoulder. She leans in close and her breath ghosts over his ear. 

“Does my lord have money to match?” she whispers. Theon feels his breath catch for a moment, and desperately pushes his legs together. 

“Aye,” he manages, voice somehow managing not to crack, “I do.” He reaches into his pockets and grabs a piece of gold. 

“I um,” he says, “I want you to _say_ you’ve slept with me.” 

“You want to give me money to _say_ I’ve slept with you?” the girl asks, raising an eyebrow. 

“There’s reasons I don’t want to,” Theon says. 

“Ah,” she says, “The rumors are true, then? You’re fucking the little lord?” 

“The little lord hasn’t spouted facial hair yet,” Theon says. Theon might not be a boy anymore, but Robb certainly _is._

“Sick lords take girls who haven’t flowered yet too,” she says. 

“I’m not,” Theon says firmly, “I just want people to think I’m a bit more experienced than I am, alright?” 

“You could actually take what you paid for, if you’d like,” the girl says. Theon wants to, truly, but he’s not about to risk it. 

“If you throw in a little extra,” the girl says, “I’ll tell them it was so good, I gave you the next time free.” Theon laughs at that. He reaches back into his pocket and pulls out another coin. The girl takes the pieces and places them in her bodice. 

“This is my kind of business, Lord Greyjoy,” she says, eyes twinkling with mischief, “you’re welcome back here any time.” 

Theon keeps paying the whores, and they keep saying they’ve slept with him. He’s sure it’s a lucrative business for them: easy, easy money. The only thing that he gets out of it is a little bit of information, which is apparently that the whole castle thinks Robb’s in love with him. All of the women he pays to say they’ve slept with him are convinced that he does this to combat rumors they’re sleeping together. 

Theon can’t see it at all. Until he can. 

One day, when they’re out on something that’s half a two person hunt and half just them fucking around, Theon makes a shot with his arrow so difficult it would have made the girls swoon. Maybe the boys too. Robb’s not just looking at him with those stars he’s always had, there’s a twinkle there too. That twinkle that Ros always gives him when she says “well, you know, you’ve paid me so many times. Might as well get your money’s worth once”. 

Theon feels his heart speed up. Robb gone from child to boy to bigger boy, and then, suddenly, now he doesn’t strike Theon as a boy anymore at all. There’s something mannish about the beard peaking out of his cheeks, the rapid dropping of his voice.

For so long, Robb was the six year old who showed him around Winterfell and made him feel welcome somewhere he really wasn’t. But now, it’s suddenly hitting him how much he’s grown. He’s nearly a man now, and there’s desire in his eyes. It goes straight to the place between Theon’s legs. 

He starts running, then, to catch his kill and to stop the stare and to kill that lusty feeling, because even though he wants to, and even though Robb wants to- he can’t risk exposing himself. Not like that. Not to Robb. It’s not fucking worth it. 

Sometimes, Theon wonders how he must look. He knows that he inherited the Greyjoy height, so even though he doesn’t tower over others like his father does, he’s able to meet most of the men at Winterfell at eye level like his sister. The angles of his face are sharp, but not in the same way as Robb’s. He has to shave bits of black peach fuzz to make it look like he’s growing proper whiskers where Robb has the beginnings of a true Northern beard. 

Robb looks every bit the lord of Winterfell that he should. Theon hopes that he looks like a lord. That’s all that he wants, after all. 

Robb pretends that the reason they’re out in the godswood tonight is to pray, but it’s just an excuse to sit outside in the relative warmth of a summer’s night and stare up at the stars. 

Robb sits up, and he’s suddenly illuminated by Theon’s lamp. He’s all sharp angles now, and his tiny sprinkling of whiskers have become a true beard. 

“You’re not a little kid anymore,” Theon says. It’s not new information, at this point. He’s been processing it for weeks now, but he’s never talked about it with Robb yet. Not really. 

“Oh,” Robb says sarcastically, “you’ve finally noticed.” 

“Don’t act like I _should_ have noticed,” Theon says, “it’s a recent development.” Robb went from the baby he met when he arrived at Winterfell to old Northern god quite rapidly, thank you very much. It’s no wonder it took Theon a while to process it. 

“You have a beard and everything. It’s weird.” Robb looks at him, then. He looks at Theon’s tiny whiskers with confusion on his face. 

“Why don’t _you_ grow a beard?” Robb asks. 

“They look scratchy,” Theon says, “wouldn’t want that on my face all the time.” It's not totally a lie, at least. Theon doesn't think he'd like a beard even if he could grow one. Robb looks like he’s considering that idea. 

“I asked mother about that once, you know, what it was like kissing father with that beard. She said it was scratchy, but a good scratchy.” 

“A good scratchy?” Theon asks, raising an eyebrow. 

“Scratchy like a sword tree,” Robb says. Theon knows what he’s referencing, of course, and it stirs something strange in him. Robb still remembers that? They haven’t fought with pine needles in seven years. There wasn’t much need of it when they started sparring with real swords. Theon tries to pretend that he’s unaffected by this memory, though. 

“Your lady mother’s crazy. I wouldn’t kiss a sword tree,” Theon says. Robb looks over, meets his eyes for a moment. He looks nervous, but he asks his question anyway, 

“Would you kiss a man, though?” He shouldn’t he shouldn’t he shouldn’t-

But he does. 

“I suppose,” Theon says, and he glues on his flirtiest smile that he uses when he becomes Theon Greyjoy, Whoring Champion of Winterfell for the rest of the men, “It’d just have to be the right man.” If Theon weren’t worried about her revealing his secret, he’d sleep with just about any girl in Winterfell or Wintertown. If Theon weren’t worried about blowing his secret, he’d sleep with exactly one man. 

Robb blushes as bright as his hair. 

“Really?”

“Really.” Robb bites his lip nervously. He looks to Theon, then looks away again. He’s clearly sizing up the situation, strategist that he is. He’s hesitant enough that Theon realizes that Robb really has never done this before. He’s not even learned how to fake it the way that Theon has. 

“Would you kiss me, truly?” Robb asks nervously. The strategist has clearly decided that the risks are worth taking. Theon takes a step forward and pulls Robb into him until their touching, chest to chest, hip to hip. He can feel Robb’s erection against his thigh. Then he wraps his arms around the boy’s back and leans forward until he can feel Robb’s breath against his lips. 

“What do you think?” Theon asks with a smirk. 

“I think,” Robb says, “I want to do that again.” Then, Robb kisses him fiercely. And well, Theon’s not about to turn it down, not when his whole body feels like it’s been set aflame with want. The kiss goes and goes and goes- until Robb breaks it, Theon gasping for air, nearly dragging him back into the kiss. No, no escapes. Only kisses. 

“We’re fucking in the godswood,” Robb says, with eyes as wide as the moon above them, “Should we be fucking in the godswood?” 

“Wait, we’re- we’re fucking?” Theon asks. Going to fuck? He thought this would be a heavy kissing session- nothing more. But there was a clawing worry in his brain before they’d even started that it would get this far- that they’d both want to take it further and Theon wouldn’t be able to stop himself.

He does, in fact, want to take it further. If they do, Robb will know. He’ll know and Theon can’t take it back and it will change things forever. He’s dripping wet and desperately crossing his legs, but he can stop. No amount of horny is worth blowing his secret over while Theon still has some of his wits about him. 

“Well, yes,” Robb says, “I was hoping to.” Theon feels the best of his heart quickening, and the sheer need between his legs is not lessening. Ah, fuck it. If anyone won't rat him out, it’s Robb. 

“You like me, right?” Theon asks cautiously. Robb looks at him, and his eyebrows knot together. 

“You think I’d kiss you like that if I didn't?” Robb counters.

“You’d like me no matter what?”

“Yes, Theon,” Robb says, “you’re my best friend.” He thinks there’s something deeper than that, if they’re about to fuck in the godswood, but it’s earnest enough. It’s true enough. Theon can only hope that it’s strong enough to keep Robb from spilling his secret. Or hating him. 

“I made out with you in the godswood, where all my gods can see.” Well, then. All Robb’s gods are going to learn his secret, assuming they didn't know it already. 

“Fuck it, alright,” Theon says, then he pulls Robb back into a searing kiss. He’ll cross that other bridge once he comes to it. _Comes_ to it. He almost laughs at his own joke, pressing deeper into the kiss. 

They _did_ end up fucking in the godswood, and Robb did end up finding out his secret. When they’d gotten to it, Robb had said, “I don’t care what you’ve got. You’re Theon.” And that had been it and then they’d just gone back to it and- 

For a moment, Theon didn’t mind being built the way he is. 

The girls at the brothel laugh and Ros asks if he actually found a girl to bed. Theon laughs and tells her yes, of course, what else could it be? He buys as much moon tea as he can get, because he thinks that this will be happening more often now and he’s not about to risk a _pregnancy._

He downs the moon tea and drowns his thoughts of blown secrets and hopefully any bastards too. He thinks of drowning in the isles, men coming back harder and stronger after choking up seawater and being blessed by the god. He downs another cup of moon tea to get rid of the image. 

They do it more, and more, and more. Theon kind of regrets not sleeping with any of the whores earlier. Sex with Robb is different than sex with them would have been, but- it’s so _good._ Sex is good. He hasn’t been near enough to the Drowned God for him to do anything for him for years, and he’s not about to start kneeling to the Stark’s old gods or the Seven in the sept, but he might pray to a god of sex. He’d get on his knees for that. 

Lord Arryn dies. The king journeys North. While the still making his way up the Kingsroad, Theon finds a whole little of direwolf pups. One for each of Ned Stark’s children, bastard included, but none for the hostage. He’s not insulted, or anything. He’s a Greyjoy, not a Stark, so he wouldn’t want a direwolf anyway. What would he even do with such a beast when he sails home and rules the isles? 

Besides, Grey Wind doesn’t like him, much. When Theon tries to hop in bed with Robb, Grey Wind tries to take off his leg. Robb shouts “no” at his wolf and pushes between them, standing his ground between his lover and his wolf. 

“This is Theon,” Robb insists, “you can’t hurt him.” Grey Wind growls, but he doesn’t leer at Theon again. 

“We’ll be fine now,” Robb says. 

“I think.” 

“Can’t you make him sleep outside?” Theon asks. Even if the thing doesn’t attack him again, he doesn’t exactly want it staring at him as they have sex, and he would still sleep easier if the damn thing wasn’t at the foot of the bed. 

“I’m not putting him outside,” Robb says firmly, "I'm sure you'll be fine." Until Robb goes to sleep and Grey Wind bites his face off. 

“Fine,” Theon growls, pushing himself off the bed, “then you’re putting _me_ out.” Robb rushes forward and grabs him by the arm. 

“Stay,” he says, “please.” 

“No, I won’t.” 

Theon goes back to his own chambers. He curls up with Kraky for the first time in months, and wishes that the direwolves were gone. Everything was so much simpler before every child in the family got one of those little menaces but him, even the bastard.

They make up pretty quickly afterwards. It’s hard to stay angry about something as petty as a pet while Robb’s whole family is falling apart. 

Bran falls, and Lady Stark won’t leave his bedside. Lord Stark goes South with Sansa and Arya. With all the shit going on, Robb’s a bit of a mess even as he steps into the role of Lord of Winterfell. He’s trying to appear strong for his men and for his mother, but he’s falling to pieces inside. Theon takes him to bed more and more often, and he thinks that it helps, at least. Seems harder to worry with someone between your legs. 

If nothing else, it helps _him,_ and if he has to down an ocean’s worth of moon tea, at least it’s for a good cause. He never wanted working ovaries anyway. 

  
  
The Lannisters arrest Lord Stark and the whole realm falls apart. The Northmen march into battle behind Robb, and Theon follows him too. Theon downs man after man with his arrows, and he finally feels like a real one. He’s finally the brave warrior his father wanted, skilled and bloodied and worthy. 

Then they kill Lord Stark, hold Sansa and Arya hostage, and a little war becomes a big one, and soon e-fucking-nough the little six year old who took him by the hand and led him around the castle is wearing a crown and people are calling him Your Grace. It’s surreal, but Theon can’t say he’s surprised. Robb seems more like a king than either Robert or Joffrey did. Theon barely remembers what Pyke was like, before he was dragged up North among the wolves, but he can’t imagine Robb seems less like a king than Theon's own father did. 

Theon tries not to think about much of his life at Pyke, before his father declared him his son and sent him up North. Theon clings to that memory like a dying man does water. 

The only downside of Robb’s ruling style as king is how Robb seems to treat his missing sisters. Robb seems unconcerned with Sansa and Arya’s fate, at least compared to the death of his father and justice for that. Saving them just seems to him to be a pleasant byproduct of the real goal. Theon wants to tell Robb about being a hostage, about how Theon wouldn’t wish it on Robb’s sisters, but he doesn’t. Real men aren’t supposed to care about women, least of all women who helped hold them captive, so he doesn’t spare a thought or a word for them. Instead, Theon keeps marching and keeps cheering for war and keeps building up a name for himself.

It’s not quite like “The Young Wolf” but as long as people remember Theon, he can take it. He’s hungry for praise, but not _that_ hungry. 

At least at camp, Grey Wind roams and doesn’t try to attack Theon during sex. He growls up a storm, but he doesn’t look quite ready to sink his teeth into Theon. At least, not yet. 

“I don’t know why he hates you so much,” Robb mutters. 

“I’m not a Northerner,” Theon says, “I don’t really belong here with your people,” _I don’t really belong here with you,_ he thinks. He loves Robb, or at least cares deeply, but he knows as well as the next person he doesn’t belong here in the North. He’s not Robb’s hostage the way that he was his father’s, but he’s not a Stark. He’s not a sworn bannerman. He’s Ironborn, through and through, and he doesn’t think Robb’s lapdog likes that much. 

“I’m the king now,” Robb says, “I can make you belong here.” 

“By doing what? Declaring me a Stark?” Theon asks, rolling his eyes, “that’s not how things work, Robb. I’m not your blood.” Robb could legitimize Jon if he so chose, but he can’t exactly make a Greyjoy a Stark. The only way to do something like that is with a bride’s cloak. 

“Well,” Robb says, and his face is as red as his hair, “I could marry you, Theon.” Theon feels a terrible, sickly feeling pool in his stomach. 

“I don’t want to be a woman,” Theon says. Of course he isn’t one, but this isn’t like when he was little, rushing between his sister and mother’s skirts and wondering if it wouldn’t be easier to just be what they called him. The worst thing a man can be called is a woman, but the worst things that a woman can be called are far worse.

“Of course not,” Robb says, “you’re Theon. You wouldn’t be a woman. People would just. They’d call you that.” 

“I don’t want to be _called_ a woman either,” Theon says. The idea of marrying Robb is appealing, but the idea of masquerading as a woman is not. Even if being a woman wasn’t atrocious and dangerous, Theon wouldn’t want to do it. 

He imagines a Stark cloak saying “this is my woman” and calling him she and Stark Stark Stark and ownership, and it makes it hard to breathe. The thought of being called Queen makes bile rise in his throat. He thinks of only smelling the pine of the godswood and never the salty brine sea air again for the rest of his life. He wants to marry Robb and maybe he wants to be a Stark, but not at that cost. It’s far too steep. 

“Don’t you have a Frey to marry, anyway?” Theon asks. It’s half to get this topic off of him for a second, but half a true question. What about his Frey girl? 

“I don’t know her,” Robb says, and ah, there’s the crux of it. Robb doesn’t want to wed someone he didn’t choose himself and doesn’t know. 

“You’re trying to trick me into getting you out of that marriage pact,” Theon says. He can’t tell if that’s better or worse than Robb just wanting him forever and always, just for him. It’s certainly less world-changing. 

“It’s not a trick,” Robb says, crossing his arms like a petulant little boy, “I just like you, okay? You don’t have to wed me, but don’t pretend it’d just be to get out of that marriage pact.” He does seem insulted by Theon’s suggestion, actually. It’s sort of sweet. 

“Do you want to?” Robb asks cautiously. 

“No,” Theon says, “I don’t.” He does, but he can never have it the way that he’d want. Two equals standing knee deep in the seawater, speaking their vows and letting the Drowned God make them husbands as the waves crash into their knees and wash away their former trysts. Those former trysts neither of them ever had. 

Robb nods his head, and suggests something different instead. An alliance. One that brings him back to the islands, triumphant, with an idea in hand and tales of glory on his tail. Theon agrees easily. 

He can unite his best friend and his family, reunite with his sister, and finally show his father that he’s worth something. He doesn’t see any way that it could go wrong. Maybe that’s why everything does. 

When Theon finally gets to Pyke, he finds his sister. He’s happy to see her. 

“Thea?” Asha asks. 

“Theon,” he corrects. 

“We both know that’s not your name,” Asha says, “and I won’t call you that here. These aren’t Starks.” Correction: he _was_ happy to see her, at first. Asha rolls her eyes. 

“You can stop pretending, Thea.” 

“I’m not _pretending,_ Asha. I’m a man.”

“Still pretending,” Asha says, shaking her head and clicking her tongue, “how sad.” 

“I’m not pretending cause I am one” Theon hisses. Asha glares at him, dark grey eyes going steely. 

“You just want to be heir, don’t you?” Asha says. There’s something cold in her voice.  
  
“Well,” Theon says, “yes. I want my due.” He’s Balon’s son. Sons inherit, daughters don’t. It’s as simple as that. 

“I am heir, and your delusions won’t take that from me, _sister_.” 

“Brother,” Theon says, and he can feel his patience growing thin. Asha never respected him as a boy back then, and she certainly won’t stop now that it might keep her from the Seastone Chair. 

“Just cause the Starks call you boy doesn’t mean you _are_ one,” Asha says, “you still inherit after me. You’re not going to be lady of anything.” 

“We’ll see what father has to say about that,” Theon growls. Asha laughs and laughs and laughs. 

“You think father’s going to take _your_ side on this?” 

“Yes, I do.” Father was the one that said that he was a boy, after all. He has to respect Theon as his son. That’s the way that Theon remembers things. 

“Oh, you really are a softheaded little girl, aren’t you?” Theon clutches his bow the way that he used to clutch Kraky, and follows his sister into their father’s keep and then their father’s solar.

“The Prince of the Isles is back,” Asha says sarcastically as they enter. Father looks up from his papers. 

“You’re back,” father says. He sounds happy enough about it. 

“Now that you’re back, we can make a fine enough marriage pact,” Father says. _Oh,_ Theon thinks, the words like a punch to the gut, _that’s why._

“I’m not here for weddings,” Theon says, trying not to break down, “I’m here with a message.” Theon holds out the letter with the Stark seal on it. Father looks unimpressed. 

“You want us to ally with Robb Stark?” 

“She wants to be heir, too,” Asha barks. Father rolls his eyes. 

“I wouldn’t name Thea heir if she were the last of my children.” 

“My name is Theon,” he repeats. 

“You still believe that, don’t you?” Father asks. 

“Because it’s true!” Theon screeches. Father laughs at him, then. 

“You picked up your mother’s madness, I’m certain. Must run through the women.” The real memories hit him again, like a slap to the face. His _father’s_ slap to the face. His father never really accepted him as a man. He just let Theon do this so he could keep Asha instead. 

“ _I’m_ not mad,” Asha says indignantly. 

“You have _my_ genes,” father dismisses, looking down at his desk. Theon slams his hand down on the table on top of his father’s papers. Father looks up to meet his eyes. 

“I’m one of the most respected warriors in the North, and I think that you should ally with their king.” He tries to keep his voice as steady as he can manage. 

“It will be worth your while,” Theon adds. Father laughs. 

“There’s nothing that green boy can offer me that I can’t take myself,” Father says. He rips the letter off the table and makes his way over to the fireplace. 

“Father-” Father holds the letter over the flame, and Theon feels his eyes widen in his eyes. Theon rushes forward, reaching towards the letter. Father lets it drop, and laughs in his face. 

“Your first lesson, if you want to be an iron man?” Father says, “Ironborn don’t make deals. We take what we’re due.” Theon watches the letter crumple as it burns, hears the hissing of the fire as it takes every word he and Robb carefully constructed and burns it to ash. 

“That was an offer, father!” Theon says, “a good one. You could have worked together.” 

“Ironborn don’t collaborate. We conquer.” 

“We could conquer together!” Theon says, “I’m your son! You should at least _listen_ to me.” 

“You’re _no_ son of mine. No daughter, either. Are you finally going to turn that cloak of yours? You’re acting enough like a greenlander we’d think you became one.” He’s only ever worn the Greyjoy cloak, at least metaphorically. He was raised amongst wolves, but he wasn’t one of them. The fact that there wasn’t a direwolf for him was evidence enough of that. The fact that he turned down Robb’s offer to do just that is evidence enough. 

“You going to let the Stark brat wrap that cloak of his around your shoulders?” 

“I am no bride,” Theon growls. 

“His whore, then,” father says, “you’re clearly warming his bed.” Theon feels red hot shame creep over his cheeks. 

“I’m not!” 

“Prove it, little greenlander. Prove it, little whore.” Theon feels his stomach churning, but tries to convince himself that it’s alright. He has iron in his veins. He can handle a few insults. 

“Fine,” Theon says, “I’ll do whatever you want.” He just wants his father to acknowledge him as a Greyjoy son again, like he did when he sent him off all those years ago. He’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen. 

“Marry one of my bannermen to ensure their loyalty,” father says. He didn’t want to wed Robb, but the idea of wedding someone who _isn’t_ Robb almost makes him want to claw his own skin off. The idea of wedding anyone as a woman makes him feel like he’s coming apart. 

“I’ll do anything but that,” Theon says. 

“Whatever, Thea,” father says, “take a ship, for all I care. The real men will be here, making decisions.” 

Theon gathers a crew and he gathers his anger and he gathers his resentment. He pours those things into the blacksmith’s melting pot and forges himself a plan. 

Take Winterfell for his father. Make him proud. Become a proper Prince, acquire the respect and admiration of the people he grew up with. Make his sister stop hating him. Acquire proper place as heir, maybe hoards of swooning women. He’s not picky. 

He takes Winterfell easily enough. As a former Stark hostage, he knows the castle itself like the back of his hand. As a former Stark hostage, he also knows that since he drew out what little remained of their forces by attacking Torrhen’s Square, Winterfell would be left undefended- as easy to enter as a whore’s cunt. 

“You’re sitting in Robb’s chair!” Rickon shouts. That drags a memory into Theon's brain that he'd rather not have right now. Robb had carried Rickon around Winterfell the day that he started saying Robb's name, asking Rickon to say his name to _everyone._ He was so fucking proud that his name came right after mama and dad. Theon forces down the guilt the memory brings and forces on with his conquest. He makes Bran yield the castle. 

“I’m the Prince of Winterfell,” Theon says, smiling wide. For a moment, he actually believes it. 

The actual ruling isn’t much fun. It doesn’t make him feel powerful, or welcome. Everyone in the castle lets him know just how much they hate him. It even feels like the walls of Wintefell itself are against him. Theon needs allies, and he needs them fast. 

He frees a prisoner, a wretch of a man calling himself Reek. The man's creepy and disgusting, but he promises his service, and Theon’s not about to pass up that offer in a castle full of people who hated him as a hostage and want him dead as a Prince.

Asha comes. She tries to get Theon to leave. He won’t. She leaves him with ten new men and tells him to stay stay safe.

As the days grow longer and his prospects grow bleaker, the idea of leaving with her grows more and more appealing. Asha’s ships have long since sailed, though, and Bran and Rickon have long since escaped, and all he’s left with are mutinous staff and smallfolk and the name Turncloak. 

Theon curls up in bed and holds Kraky tightly to his chest and hopes that the nightmares might not come, tonight. They still do, of course. They always do. 

His rule is crumbling apart. Every time that he closes his eyes, the visions from his nightmares seem to tear into his eyes. He decides to confront the source of them. Theon goes to the godswood and stands before the heart tree. 

“I didn't kill your princes, alright?” Theon tells the old gods. “Bran and Rickon got away.” The crows caw loudly at that, indignant. Theon lies underneath the tree, looking at the red undersides of the leaves and the twisting branches, reaching up to the sky. 

“Help me keep this castle,” Theon asks them, “Or just- don't interfere. Stop fighting me.” These gods watched him fuck their king, once. That has to give him some kind of points, right? 

The cawing of the crows almost sounds like cackling. 

“Alright, alright,” he concedes, “that was a foolish request.” The old gods are _not_ his gods. They don’t want him here any more than the Northerners do. Just because he fucked a Stark doesn’t make him one, especially since he made Bran cede him the castle and made Rickon cry and made them both run off into the wilderness where they’re probably dead for real now. 

The gods of the Starks don’t owe him anything more than he owes the Starks. 

“Just stop the nightmares, alright?” he asks, voice cracking, “my waking life is a nightmare. Give me some peace when I fall asleep.” The crows caw and cackle as they fall out of the trees, the entire murder of them blackening the sky around the heart tree. The entire sky turns black with feathers and beaks and beady little eyes that look like they want to swoop down and peck out Theon's own eyes. 

Theon tries to roll over so that he can stand up and run the fuck out of here, but he’s frozen to the cold grass. The weirwood leaves above him seem to stare him down and then they start dripping liquid like raindrops, but it’s red and metallic like blood.

The light rainfall turns into a downpour, and the blood drenches his clothes and turns him into a paralyzed, sticky mess. The smell of blood overwhelms the smell of pine. 

Grey Wind appears and bites off his fingers, and Theon feels pain- pain-pain- Then, suddenly the wolf in front of him is dying with a thousand arrows piercing his hide. The scene shifts, and Grey Wind becomes not a dying wolf but a wolf, human hybrid. Grey Wind’s head on top of- that’s- that’s- 

_Robb’s body._ Grey Wind’s head sits on Robb’s shoulders. The wolf’s eyes are glossy and dead, the bottom of his head bloody and broken. It sits upon Robb’s shoulders, blood dripping down his dark, fine clothing. There’s an arrow sticking out of his chest. The thing that used to be Robb and Grey Wind opens its mouth and bares its sharp, wolfish teeth. 

“Theon,” Grey Wind’s head says with Robb’s voice, “why did you betray me?” The words echo in his brain, digging into the sides like barbs. 

“Robb, I didn't-” Grey Wind opens his mouth wide and the blood pours out like a waterfall. 

Theon’s eyes jerk open, and the weirwood leaves in his mind’s eye become the real weirwood leaves in the godswood. He sits up abruptly, shocked that he can actually move again. He gently grasps the soft, green grass underneath his fingers. The weirwood is just a weirwood, with a single black crow sitting on a branch, eying him curiously. The sky isn’t black with feathers but a lifeless shade of grey. 

It was just a dream. Theon must have fallen asleep out here, talking to the Starks’ old gods. Those gods have just told him how much they care for him. Theon pushes himself to his feet and then glares at the tree. 

“The others take your Starks,” Theon says, spitting at the ground beneath the heart tree. In that moment, Theon truly means it. He hates them _all._ Bran and Rickon can freeze to death. Sansa and Arya get can get wed off to Lannister allies in King’s Landing. Lady Stark can drown in the Trident. Even Robb can impale himself on his crown. He spits once more, for good measure.

Theon stays in the castle, after that. 

Rodrik Cassel comes with his men, men enough to kill Theon seventy times over. He has one bargaining chip, a terrible, horrible one, but he plays it. 

_Attack, and I’ll hang your daughter_ , he threatens. Little Beth Cassel, the same age as Arya. Well. He’s already ordered children killed. What’s one more of nobler birth on this conscience? But he knows killing the girl won’t save him anyway, even if he did it.

Maybe he should leave- take the black like Maester Luwin suggested. Leave behind this massive failure and whatever legacy it will leave him. Being someone who threatens to hang little girls is not a particularly good legacy, he suspects. And the Watch can't be so terrible. It's an organization for men, and it's well respected here in the North. They’ll let him take the vows, and as long as he’s not discovered he’ll be able to live there as man. Unquestioned. Unwed. Unowned. 

Jon Snow’s like to stab him in the back, but that might more of a pleasant end than whatever Rodrik Cassel has in store for him. 

Thankfully, then, salvation comes. It’s Reek, the man who helped Theon with his occupation, followed by something that resembles an army. They’re here to help, they have to be, and he rushes to undo the clasp and open the gates. Theon opens the door and lets hell in. 

After that comes the flames and the shouts and the bright pink banners emblazoned with flayed men. The world seems to be turning on its heel, and it feels like something out of one of his nightmares, only these aren’t bleeding weirwoods- they’re men flayed alive. 

These are Boltons, ready to tear Winterfell to the ground. The entire castle, it seems has caught flame. Smiler is on fire, kicking in the air in pain, screaming like a man, and Theon feels dread he’s never felt before. Everything in the castle will burn, from the godswood to the art projects Rickon made him Theon knows are still on Robb's bedside, to Kraky, stuck inside Theon’s own room. Everything will be destroyed, and Theon feels dread as his breath speeds as fast as a galloping horse. He never wanted to destroy Winterfell. He wanted to rule it. He wanted to _belong_. 

Then he feels a blow to the face, the hard ground, and nothing more. 

* * *

He wakes up, afterwards, in a cell underneath the Dreadfort. He’d quickly come to wish he never woke up at all. 

His vocal chords forget how to do anything but scream. 

Theon shouldn’t have turned down Asha’s offer to leave with her. He should have followed her to Deepwood Motte- he should have just let followed his big sister out of there, because she might be a bitch- but she’s always protected him. 

Now he’s stuck with Ramsay. Ramsay, who tricked him into letting Ramsay kill boys and pretending they were the Starks. Ramsay, who let him try to escape to laugh and torture him when he caught him. Ramsay, who flays the skin off his fingers and then makes Theon beg for him to cut them off. Ramsay, who reeks of sweat and hounds and blood and never lets Theon forget that he’s a weak traitor who no one ever loved.

Well. Ramsay isn’t exactly wrong about that one. 

Ramsay, somehow, doesn’t know his secret yet. There was something, at some point, about him having large tits for a man, when Ramsay had taken bits of skin out of his back, but that was the worst that it had gotten. Ramsay hadn’t reached in his pants yet, somehow hadn’t realized if he had there would be nothing there. 

Drowned God, he just wanted to keep it that way. But then one day, Ramsay pulls his pants down, and Theon slams his eyes shut. He doesn’t want to see whatever this will lead to.

Ramsay starts laughing. 

“All that talk of the women you’ve bedded, and you’re one of them,” Ramsay laughs, and laughs, and laughs. 

“Might as well make use of that cunt of yours,” Ramsay says, “it’s the only thing you’re good for.” Theon tries to block it out. It isn’t easy, and it doesn’t work, and it hurts, and it hurts, and it hurts. 

Ramsay says that he’s a girl. Ramsay says that he reeks. Says he reeks of sweat and blood, that the cum dripping down his cunt has started to reek as badly as the rest of him. Ramsay used to call _himself_ Reek, but now he calls himself Lord and he calls Theon Reek and he hurts and he hurts and he hurts. He hurts Theon if he calls him anything but “m’lord” and himself anything but a girl and Reek. 

Well, he’s always been weak. Might as well make things rhyme. 

Reek, Reek, it rhymes with weak. That’s how he remembers his name. He’s always been weak, known it deep in the bottom of his gut. Weak, weak, weak. Lord Ramsay always tells him so. On that part he’s consistent. There are other parts where he’s not. For one, Lord Ramsay can’t decide if he’s hideous or gorgeous. 

“Reek, my beautiful, hideous girl,” he says. Lord Ramsay holds him by the face, digging his fingers into his cheeks until they bleed. Reek feels his broken teeth clanking together in pain. Reek forces down his protests, and lets Lord Ramsay do as he wishes. Lord Ramsay always does what he wishes, and all arguing ever got him was pain. 

Yes, he’s hideous. 

Yes, he’s a girl. 

Yes, he’s Reek. 

_Yes, yes, yes, m’lord. Just stop_ **_hurting me._**

“You’re just the ugliest girl in the whole, wide world,” Lord Ramsay says. 

“Yes, m’lord.” 

“No one could ever care for such a wretch of a woman,” he says, “you’ll always just be my Reek.” 

“Yes, m’lord. Reek rhymes with freak,” he says, and it feels disgusting to say, but it feels right too. Like somewhere, deep inside, he’s always felt this way. Felt like the freak everyone claimed he was. 

Lord Ramsay says that he’s a girl. Reek knows his name now, he does, but he knows he’ll never be a girl. Even Lord Ramsay can’t make him into that. He’s a wretch, but he’s not a wretch of a woman. Just a wretch. An unworthy man. A creature, but a creature that’s a he. 

They travel from the Dreadfort to Winterfell, and Reek stumbles behind Lord Ramsay’s horses as his lord laughs. 

"Welcome home," Lord Ramsay says as he finally stops his horse and dismounts. Then he sends Reek a smug look. 

“But Winterfell was never home, was it?” he asks.

“No, m’lord,” Reek says, shaking his head, and Lord Ramsay _is_ right on that one. The castle of Winterfell itself seems to hate him. Right now, though, the castle seems familiar. Reek pushes the thoughts away, and lets Lord Ramsay drag him in and tell him how he’s going to be Warden of the North, one day, and being a Warden’s freakish whore, broken toy is the best he can hope for, really. 

“Aren’t I generous, Reek? Letting a freak girl like you bask in this glory?” 

“Yes, m’lord,” Reek tells him. 

“I’ll take you in Lord Stark’s old chambers tonight,” Lord Ramsay whispers in his ear, “make you feel like a little lady.” Reek shutters. Lord Ramsay keeps his promise, and he takes him so hard that Reek can barely walk right the next day. 

Lord Ramsay introduces Reek to his bride, the next day. Reek knows one thing. He knows that is not Arya Stark; it’s Jeyne Poole. Her face is too round and her nose is too buttonish and her eyes- her eyes are brown. Arya Stark’s eyes were grey and her hair was black, not a soft, warm brown. He tries not to think about it, tries not to even look at her- tries to act as though she will go away if he’s not looking at her. She doesn’t go away when he stops looking at her, just like Lord Ramsay doesn’t. 

“Theon,” says the girl who is not Arya Stark, but must be. He shakes his head. 

“I’m Reek,” he tells her. There was something brave to Theon, shooting off arrows and riding off to war. There’s nothing brave to Reek. 

“I’m Jeyne, and you’re Theon,” she says, grasping at his arm, “please, you have to remember-” 

“Reek rhymes with weak,” he tells her. _Understand,_ he begs her, _you have to understand._

“Theon,” she repeats, poking a finger into his chest, “and I’m Jeyne.” Jeyne, Jeyne, it rhymes with _pain._

“No,” he says, shaking his head, urgently, “you’re Arya. It doesn’t rhyme with anything.” If her name doesn’t rhyme with anything, then she can’t be meek or weak or freak or in pain. She can just be Arya. She can just be safe. 

She is not safe. No one is safe. 

There is a wedding, or a travesty of one. He walks her down the aisle and Not Arya loses her wolf cloak for a flayed man. She’s dragged off for the bedding, and Lord Ramsay makes him help. Reek thinks about the dagger in his hands. Thinks about ending Not Arya, or ending Lord Ramsay, but he just cuts her dress like Lord Ramsay wants because he’s Reek and meak and weak and- 

Not Arya screams and screams, and then Lord Ramsay sets her aside and takes him next. Reek doesn’t scream, not any more. 

Lady Barbrey Dustin drags him into the crypts with her, through the cobwebs and the dank stench and into the bowels of a castle that hates him. She stands him in front of the statues of long dead Starks and tells him how much she hated them. 

“Why do you love the Starks?” she asks Reek. The truth of it rises deep within his chest, and he can feel it trying to claw its way out. 

“I wanted to be one of them,” he admits, to her, to himself, to the Stark ghosts and their old gods. He wanted to be a Stark but never could be, at least without giving up being _him_. Barbrey’s look doesn’t soften. The boy he was wanted to be a Stark for true, by birth- or at least a true fosterling. He never wanted to be a hostage, and he never wanted to be a bride. Maybe he never even wanted to be a prince, in truth. He just wanted to belong. 

“And never could be. You and I have more in common than you know, my lord.” Barbrey is a hard, cold woman, like a Northern wind given flesh and blood. She looks at the statues of the dead Starks, and she hates. 

Reek looks around the statues, but comes up disappointed. Robb is dead and gone, but he has no statue down in these crypts. It’s like he never will. Reek cries, then, tears falling softly from his eyes. Robb cared for him, and he betrayed him and now Robb is dead- killed by the Boltons and the Freys he forsook. They sewed Grey Wind's head on his corpse, if Lord Ramsay told it true. Reek can still see that image from his nightmares vividly in his mind, and hates himself for not taking it for the premonition it was. Old Nan always spoke of greenseers, didn't she? He should have done something- he should have been there. 

_I should have died with him,_ he thinks bitterly. The air in the crypts seems lighter, after that, like something ominous and sinister dissipated along with the thought. It’s the first time since his trip back to Pyke that he feels like the castle hasn’t wanted to eat him alive. 

The girl who is not Arya Stark, not truly, rots away in her room and Lord Ramsay laughs and laughs. Lord Ramsay does nothing but laugh, and it's always cruel. His laughter is a harsh, loud sound just like the barking of his dogs before they rip a living person apart. 

Not Arya withers and withers, but she never stops saying that wretched name. That terrible name that _is not his._

“Theon, Theon, Theon.” He tries to look the other way, and hope that Lord Ramsay will forget about her, about him, about whatever it is and leave her alone, but Not Arya withers and withers and hurts and cries and she calls him Theon and Theon and Theon, never Reek, never creature or whore or freak. Just Theon. 

Jeyne Poole calls him Theon, and the memories come more and more often, completely unbidden. He was once Theon Greyjoy, a naive little boy who wanted to be a Stark. A brave man who followed his king into battle, taking down men with the accuracy of his arrows. A loving man, who whispered sweet nothings to Robb Stark under the furs and promised that everything would be alright, because he’d make it so. A turncloak, who took everything Robb ever gave him and spit on it and his castle and his brothers. A humiliated man, who let Ramsay Bolton make him into a groveling servant, a shameless whore. 

The memories are too much to take, happy and crushing and filled with regret. He’s been everything and nothing, and it hurts to even think about. Not thinking is the way Lord Ramsay wants him. It's always been so much easier. Just do his will, and all will be alright. There’s a rhyme to it, a reason, a _belonging_. 

Reek doesn’t think that he wants to be Theon again. Theon is lonely and sad and out of place. Reek doesn’t like his place, but he knows he belongs there. He knows he’s _wanted._

He’s not sure what leads him out to the godswood, but he ends up there all the same. The pines around the godswood smell just as they did on his first day in Winterfell. Back when Robb told him about stabby sword trees and they fought like knights with the pine needles. Back when they were young, and innocent, and they shared their first kiss underneath the trees. 

But he’s not Theon, he tells himself- he’s not- he can’t be- he’s nothing and-

Theon was brave and he was a coward. He was loyal until he became a traitor. He was complicated and human, not just a creature. Not whatever Reek has become. Reek stumbles and frets, worrying at one of his finger stubs as he wanders towards the heart tree. His hands must look like a little girl played “he loves me, he loves me not with them”. Reek pushes the thought and the memory away. It’s not his. It’s not Reek’s. 

He looks up at the red leaves of the sacred weirwood, red like Robb’s hair, red like the blood that must have streamed down his throat as they took off his head. Reek remembers blood falling from the weirwood leaves once, in a nightmare. Remembers a wolf’s head on Robb’s body asking, “why did you betray me?” 

_I should have died with him,_ he thinks, again. _I should have died with him._

The thought stabs into his brain like a needle, like the scent of pine, like the memories he’s never wanted back. Robb was the one person who ever cared about him, and Theon betrayed him to parade around as a prince and become Ramsay Bolton’s broken little toy. He swore himself to the little boy who took him by the hand when he came to Winterfell as a scared little boy and never let go. And then Theon betrayed him. 

“Theon,” the trees whisper,” Theon.” The crows in the branches take flight, cawing his name, and he feels something else take flight too. His heart, beating somewhere deep inside his chest. 

“Theon,” it throbs, “Theon, Theon.” 

He wants to do something, something reckless, something brave. Something that makes him redeemable. 

He can’t save Robb, but he can save _someone_. He can save Robb’s fake sister. Theon can save Jeyne from some of her pain. 

He works with the washerwomen, and he plans, and he fears. He doesn’t let that stop them from escaping, no matter how much he fears and fears and fears. Death is better than Lord Ramsay. He knows that now, has always known that, deep down in his coward heart. 

They flew from Winterfell. Jeyne’s ribs were broken by the time he landed on her, but he forced her up, forced them both up. 

“We have to keep going,” he tells her, “it’s alright, he can’t hurt you again.” It’s a lie and they both know it. Lord Ramsay can always hurt them. But they run, and they run, and they run. And they find Stannis’s encampment before Lord Ramsay finds them. They take Jeyne off to treat her injuries and Theon finds his sister. 

Asha looks to him with shock and horror in her eyes, “Thea?” 

“Theon,” he corrects, smiling despite his broken teeth, “you have to remember your name.” She rushes forward, and she hugs him so tightly it hurts. 

“Theon,” she agrees. Asha calls him Theon, and that’s all he ever fucking wanted. He cries into her shoulder until he runs out of tears.

They become Stannis’s hostages. Or, in Jeyne’s case, his “guest”. Jeyne requests Theon’s presence, and as “Arya Stark” her word holds some sway. She takes his hand and slips it into hers. She chooses the one that’s missing more fingers, but they still slide together effortlessly. 

“I’m sorry that I didn’t save you earlier,” Theon says. He had the knife, back at the wedding night. He had it in his hands, but he used it to do Ramsay’s bidding instead of cutting him down. The thought sends his stomach twisting inside of him in guilt. Weak, weak, he starts to think, but Jeyne squeezes his hand. 

“You saved me eventually,” Jeyne says, “that’s more than anyone else would have done.” He should have done a lot more than that a lot quicker. Theon laughs, and he can feel the sound get caught up in the back of his throat. 

“Real knight in shining armor I am.” Jeyne shakes her head furiously. 

“Do not say that about yourself,” she says, looking into his eyes, holding his hand tightly, “You’re the man of my dreams.” Theon’s had dreams, before. Terrible nightmares at Winterfell of direwolves and dead Robb and all the people he hurt. 

“The man of your dreams or the man of your nightmares?” Theon asks. 

“Dreams, Theon.” She looks down at her hands, and softly worries at her thumb. “You know the man of my nightmares.” They both know that man. Intimately. Theon starts laughing nervously. There’s no way that Jeyne could want him, not for real. He was defective long before Ramsay got his hands on him. Ramsay made him help when he- when- when Jeyne- when she- in the marriage bed. 

But he made Jeyne watch, afterwards, as he broke in the marriage bed again. With his Reek this time. Theon feels ready to heave as the memory hits him. Jeyne knows and she still- she still-

“I’m not a real man,” Theon says, “you know this. You’ve seen it.” How could she have watched Ramsay pounding into his cunt and still think he’s a man worth getting starry eyed over? It hurts to say those words, but that’s what he’s always been told. The nothing he has between his legs renders his manhood nothing as well. 

“You just don’t have a cock,” Jeyne says. She grins a sad little grin. “Trust me, I’ve had enough cocks to know one doesn’t make you a man.”

“Robb said something like, once,” Theon says. Jeyne’s eyes widen. 

“Lord Robb had that many cocks?” she asks, and there’s fear in her eyes. Theon lets out an inhuman laugh at that. 

“No- no,” he says, shaking his head, “I think Robb never touched a cock but his own.” Jeyne looks confused. 

“Then what did you mean?” she asks. 

“He just- he said that I didn’t need a cock to be a man,” Theon says, “that I’d always be Theon.” Despite the suggestion that they marry, Theon still thinks Robb considered him a man until the end. Theon holds onto that now. There was a point when he was all the man Robb wanted. 

“You’re all the man I ever wanted,” Jeyne says, and it almost startles Theon how close her thoughts echo his own, “my own hero.” He can feel his eyes water, and he thinks this is joy? It’s been so long since he was happy, but now Jeyne is safe, and he’s Theon again and she’s calling him man and she maybe loves him and he maybe loves her- it’s just- it’s overwhelming. It’s a tidal wave of good after a whole hurricane of bad. 

His hands are broken, missing the fingers Ramsay cut off for kicks, but Jeyne’s hands still fit into them as if they were made to. He knows how that flower would have ended, now- with _she loves me._

She places a chaste kiss to his cheek, and then blushes like the maiden she was before she left Winterfell. Theon feels a blush creep to his cheeks too. He’s never had anything this soft before with anyone. 

Neither of them want to kiss deeper, not now, maybe not ever again, but it’s nice to cuddle together for warmth. It’s nice for both of them to know that there’s at least one person in Westeros who cares.

* * *

Asha’s sentenced to burning. Theon’s sentenced to hanging. 

“They’re going to _burn_ you?” Theon asks skeptically. Asha takes a big gulp of ale. She seems to always be taking big gulps of ale, nowadays. Counting down the days until you go up in flames must do that to a person. 

“I never fucking know,” Asha says, “Stannis’s red woman wants to burn everyone to the ground. All his queen’s men want me burning, but it never happens. Maybe he doesn’t kill women. Maybe the bloke just likes me.” 

“He must love _me_ , then. They’re just going to hang me,” Theon says. Hanging’s supposed to be a less painful death than burning. 

“Aye, I heard.” Theon can’t read his sister’s look. He doesn’t remember anything well, anymore, but he thinks he used to be able to read her.

“You could tell him you’re a woman,” Asha says gently, “might get you some sympathy. Broken birds and the like. He doesn’t seem to be executing us pretty ladies.” Asha flips her chin length hair at that, and Theon laughs a little. Asha, a lady? She’s a woman, aye, but she’s no lady. 

“But I’m _not_ one,” Theon says, and he’s not a woman. If he kept one bit of himself while Ramsay flayed the rest away, he kept that. 

“Theon,” Asha says, “I know you don’t feel like a woman, or well, you _aren't_ a woman.” Asha sighs. “You never have been, ever since you were little, but would you just- just say you are one? If it could save you?” 

“Stannis’ll hang me as Theon or he’ll decide he won’t.” He was never Althea and he was never Thea and he was never Reek. 

“I won’t go back to pretending,” he whispers. He’s Theon, traitor to Robb and savior to Jeyne. Despised son of Balon and little brother of Asha. He just wants to be himself, whatever there is of that left. 

“You were always my favorite sibling,” Asha tells him, “Rodrik and Maron, they were horrible. I kind of hated them, but you were always my little si-” Asha cuts off the word, “I always thought you were my little sister, and that I couldn’t love a brother. But since you're my little brother, I guess I can.” She doesn’t hug him like she did when they were children, but she does smile at him as she punches his shoulder. 

“Least with hanging you won’t lose any of that iron in your veins,” she says. Theon smiles at her with broken teeth, and he remembers the girl that used to protect him from their brothers and tease him and make him feel loved. Now, he finally feels like she sees him for real- that she loves him not for the sister that she wanted but the brother that she actually got. It’s a good feeling to have before getting hanged. 

Normally, a highborn girl would never be allowed to sleep in the same tent as a boy she’s not married to, but everyone can see that Jeyne’s lost whatever innocence she had. If she wants the broken little Greyjoy boy in her tent for some comfort, no one will openly object. She’s “Arya Stark” and she’s sad and lost, and everyone just wants Ned Stark’s little girl to be safe and happy. 

The only thing that makes her approach being happy is Theon Greyjoy, and no one’s about to rip little Lady Arya away from him. At least, not before he's executed. Jeyne is not pleased to hear that Theon is being hanged. 

“They can’t hang you,” are the first words Jeyne says when he returns to the tent. 

“They can, and they will. King Stannis will do whatever he wants.” 

“And you’ll just let him?” Jeyne demands, crossing her arms and glaring, “doesn’t that sound… weak?” _Oh, that’s a low blow,_ he thinks. Theon plops down on the bed beside her. 

“I can’t fight a king, especially not when he’s keeping you safe. That’s all I want, to keep you safe.” Theon loves her. He just wants her to be safe and happy and whole. Jeyne looks about ready to start crying again. 

“You can’t keep me safe when you’re hanged,” she protests. Theon takes her hand and kisses the back of it. 

“You’re Lord Stark’s daughter,” Theon says, “everyone loved him. These men will keep you safe until they take you to the Wall. Then Jon will keep you safe. Jon loved Arya.” Theon tried not to remember Pyke much, at Winterfell, but he sometimes thought that when Jon was with Arya, he reminded Theon of Asha. 

“I’m not Arya,” Jeyne says, curling into a little ball, “I’m just the girl who used to bully her. Jon knew about Arya Horseface, I know it.” She shakes her head over and over over again no. Theon grabs her by the shoulders and steadies her. 

“Jon Snow is the most honorable person I ever met,” Theon promises her, “more than Lord Stark, more than Robb. He won’t cast you out.” When Jon looks at this broken Not Arya, he’ll be disappointed and maybe even angry, but Theon knows he’ll still protect her. He’s so good it’s almost infuriating. Tears pool in Jeyne Poole’s brown eyes. 

“But you’ll die,” she says, “if Jon’s so honorable, come with me. You can take the black.” He remembers, faintly, a time he almost _did_ take the black. It didn’t go well for him then, either. 

“I can’t take the black if I’m dead, Jeyne,” he says, "There’s no use fighting it. Stannis will kill me or Jon will. I might as well die here with both you and Asha.” He feels tears pooling in his eyes as he looks at his beautiful Poole girl. He doesn’t want to die. He’s just found something new to live for. Jeyne, Jeyne, no longer in pain

She starts to cry, but her brown eyes are warm and full of love. Jeyne wraps her arms around him tightly, holding her body firmly against his body. She throws herself down to a lying position, then, and him along with her. 

“Jeyne,” he says, “I need to stand up.” He doesn’t remember why, but he’s sure he had something to do. 

“You can’t leave,” she orders him. Well, whatever it was, it couldn’t have been that important. He only has a few days left to live, and there’s no place he’d rather be than here in Jeyne’s arms. 

“I won’t tonight,” he promises. That’s the best that he _can_ promise. Jeyne squeezes tighter for a moment, so tightly Theon thinks his chest might pop, but then she lets her hold slip to a softer one. 

They lie together, cuddled together for warmth and comfort and all those things they thought they’d never get again. He takes her hand, and holds it firmly, like she’s the most precious thing in all the world. As far as Theon’s concerned, she is. 

  


Theon doesn’t want to pretend, but Jeyne has no trouble pretending. At least, not when it can save him. Asha marches into Stannis’s tent, Jeyne trailing and dragging Theon behind her. 

“We’re here to barter for his life,” Asha says, jutting a finger towards Theon. 

“Lady Asha, you have nothing to bargain,” Stannis says coldly. Then he turns to Jeyne. 

“But _you_ do, Lady Stark.” His cold, blue eyes meet hers with his demand. 

"What would you like, Your Grace?" Jeyne asks, and she sounds every bit a proper lady. All that time she spent around Sansa when they were children truly paid off. 

“Swear fealty to me, and I’ll let you keep your broken kraken boy. Maybe even his blasphemous sister.” This makes sense, of course. In this lie, Jeyne isn’t just Arya. She’s Lady Stark, last of the blood of Winterfell. This is the fealty of all the North. 

“I swear it,” Jeyne says, with a tone full of authority but none of the gods given authority to use it, “I swear the fealty of the North.” Stannis nods. 

“We will discuss marriages later,” he eyes Asha for a moment, “for the both of you.” Then he eyes Theon. 

“The Greyjoys may accompany you to visit your brother at the Wall, if it would please you.” Jeyne smiles, and it’s a radiant smile that crinkles her brown eyes. 

“Your Grace, nothing would please me more,” And Theon loves her, and she loves him, and here they are now, what’s left of House Stark. The hostage and the steward’s daughter, mourning the halcyon days when they had the scraps off the Starks' table, wishing they were part of them. And then there’s Theon's sister, banished daughter of a kingdom that never wanted either of them, making amends.

None of them were ever wanted where they should be, not really. They were just looking at what they couldn’t have, knowing what they never would be. A pair of three misfits. 

He wonders what Robb would have thought of them, the trio of misfits. Robb always fit, perfect little lord of Winterfell. Loved. Appreciated. Talented. It was hard to love him, some days. Theon will never know what Robb would have thought now, though. He’s long dead, and Theon isn’t. There’s no way to make amends but to keep on living. 

Asha grabs Theon by one shoulder and Jeyne by the other and drags them to a more secluded area near the King’s tent. 

“Why don’t you get married?” Asha asks.

“What?” Theon asks. 

“Get married. Here, now. I know the wedding words, mostly. I’m offering.” Theon feels his heart speed up at that. 

“Married?” he asks. 

“We can’t,” Jeyne says. 

“Why not?” Asha asks. 

“I’m not a maiden, for one,” she says, blushing bright crimson. 

“Neither am I, sweetling,” Asha says, “neither is he. No one’ll care much, since it won’t be legal or anything. I think it would make you happy, though. What do you say?” 

“It _would_ make me happy,” Jeyne says, and she sends Theon a hopeful look. Theon smiles, and he doesn’t even mind that they can both see his broken teeth. He nods. They slip into an abandoned tent and then Asha starts her bastardized version of a greenlander wedding. They say the vows (or an approximation of them) and neither of them can stop smiling. Theon’s face almost hurts from how wide it is by the time that Asha gets to the kissing part. 

“Yady dady dah,” Asha says, “you’re lord husband and lady wife. Kiss the bride.” Jeyne leans forward, and kisses him chastely on the lips. It’s about as legal as those fake weddings Jeyne and Sansa used to put on in the godswood, but Theon smiles just the same. He loves her, and even a farce of a wedding is better than none. Asha just gave him the greatest gift that she could ever give.

Theon takes her hand and kisses the back of it. 

“My lady wife,” he says, smiling up at her and Jeyne giggles like she used to back as a girl. 

“My lord husband,” she tells him, smiling at him sweetly. Asha claps a hand on Theon’s shoulder and smiles at him. 

“There won’t be a bedding party,” Asha says with a wink, “but I’ll escort you back to her tent.” Asha looks between them, lovesick, broken fools that they are, and she smiles. 

“Not sure you’ll make it all the way before you have each other’s clothes off, though.” Maybe someday soon, if they both live long enough- they’ll want sex, too. Theon can tell that Jeyne is a pretty woman, and he would like to make love to her, someday. Not now, though. He thinks, judging by Jeyne’s reactions, that she feels that way too. Neither of them tell this to Asha, though. There’s no reason to burst her bubble when she’s so excited that there’s this tiny bit of joy in their dismal world. 

Someday soon, the war and suffering will return, but not today. Today he’s Theon and he’s safe and he’s loved. He has a big sister who loves him and a half-legal lady wife. Today, that’s enough.


End file.
